


Burn

by L122ytorch



Category: Smallville, small - Fandom - Fandom
Genre: Confession, First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-04-06 19:47:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14064246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/L122ytorch/pseuds/L122ytorch
Summary: Clark witnesses tragedy to the extremes, trying to help as many as he can, but who does he have to turn to at the end of the day when he's the one who needs saving?





	Burn

It was late, the middle of the night actually. Four hours ago the sun had set over the Kansas cornfields... and four hours from now, it would rise. The air seemed dry and thin, stripped of warmth and moisture by the brutal winter. 

Stillness seemed like a palpable force, the quiet was overwhelming, and despite running through open country, Clark had never felt more claustrophobic. He gulped, feeling his throat click against itself dryly. Every sense he had was zeroed in on himself and it seemed like too much to bear.

Something must’ve snapped in his brain. Sanity gave way, crumbling atop Clark’s inhibitions and bringing them down to their foundation. His lungs burned, dry as the freezing breath he heaved in. 

Invulnerable. He was supposed to be invulnerable. Supposed to be. So why did it feel like he was dying? His soul turned inside out and his mind left with no recourse to turn it inside right again.

Running towards the familiar Scottish castle on the outskirts of Smallville, he felt quite vulnerable, and uncannily human. When he began running four thousand miles ago, he broke the sound barrier but still wished he could go faster. His one advantage was that the whistling wind dried his tears before they had a chance to form and fall. 

He wasn’t sure what he’d do when he got there, just knew that he needed to be there. Needed it like he needed the sun to give him strength. 

Down the drive, over the black wrought iron gate, a powerful jump to the roof and a climb into the unlocked window of one of the towers. He didn’t have a second chance at any of this, if he stopped, even for a second, the security cameras would catch him. So his actions unfolded in super speed succession. Into the window, running through the hall, down the stairs, down another corridor and into Lex’s room. 

There were cameras everywhere except Lex’s bedroom (a quick x-ray scan confirmed) so there was no stopping until he was inside. There was also no way to conceal the swoosh of wind whipped up at his sudden stop, the breeze from which had fluttered over to the king sized bed with a single occupant. The rush of air sent rippling waves across the exposed purple sheets that outlined Lex's body. They caught the shimmering silver light of the half moon that poured in through the looming window adjacent to the bed.

It wasn’t the surging breeze that woke Lex, but the smell that accompanied it...like burning embers. The tenuous state of sleep he was in quickly melted away, but he remained calm, acting as if asleep for another second or so before striking.

In one swift motion, Luthor reached beneath his pillow and pulled out a shiny black Glock, training it on whoever had the balls to break into the Luthor mansion. As his eyes adjusted, he could easily make out a shadowed figure leaning against the wall at the foot of his bed.

Clark saw Lex's actions unfold in slow motion, but he reacted in real time."Woah! Lex, it's me!" Clark said, his hands shooting out defensively, not that he had to worry about bullets.

"Clark?" Lex sounded incredulous. He blinked his eyes several times trying and failing to see through the dark, his finger still a hair's width away from the trigger. "What the hell! How did you get in here?!" he nearly yelled. He swiveled his head to observe the sleek clock that sat on the nightstand. "It's two in the morning for fuck's sake!"

Clark kept his hands out in a show of submission. "I know...I know...I'm sorry Lex. I didn't mean to startle you, I didn't even mean to wake you." Whoops. As soon as the words left Kent's lips, he realized just how creepy they were. But it was the truth.

"So what? You broke into my house just to watch me sleep? And you thought I was the stalker with that room of stuff on me and you...."

A beat of silence passed between them and Clark flashed back to that day when Lex had revealed said room to him. He could recall the panic that rose in his chest at the sight of the simulation of Lex's Porsche hitting him at full speed, their virtual bodies tumbling through the guard rail and into the river. The betrayal he felt at seeing his life laid out like a murder-mystery trying to be solved. Detective Lex was on the case. 

It was only later that Clark realized how much the room was actually about Lex rather than him. 

And now, here he stood, intruding on his former best friend in the middle of the night with no explanation. Suddenly he felt very. very. stupid.

"I shouldn't have come...I...I...should go," Clark stammered, his voice falling oddly on his own ears. He sounded shaken, like a hostage at gunpoint.

Calling Clark out wasn't the best move on Lex's part. He wanted answers, not for Clark to run...once again.

"No...wait," Lex leaned forward in bed. "I don't want you to go. But how do I know you're the actual Clark? Not some mutant shapeshifter or...if you are the actual Clark, how do I know you're not on something?"

"It's really me Lex," Clark whispered. "And I've got news for you...I've always been a mutant. And no, I'm not on something...although that's not such a bad idea."

Lex was startled by the 'mutant' admission, but he pushed forward. "Tell me something only Clark would know."

Clark shuffled his feet and shifted his weight, trying to dredge up some memory that Lex would know that only he would know.

"Fine...how about...the box you gave me, the one to give Lana back her necklace, it was your mothers, it was Lillian's."

Lex finally lowered the weapon that glinted in the sparse light of the room.

"I should have you arrested for breaking and entering," there was a bitter edge to his voice. 

"I wouldn't blame you," Clark's voice floated through the immaculate bedroom, sounding small and defeated. He and Lex hadn't been on the best terms, their friendship unraveling so fast that the pair had exchanged blows not two weeks ago. Even so, Lex could tell that something was wrong. Very wrong. And beside Clark's flimsy tone, there was that familiar, awful smell that drifted towards Lex with the heater that kicked on.

"What's that smell?" he asked first. "It smells like burning wood in here."

"Sorry, that's me." 

Lex's head tilted in confusion. Even in the black of the room, Clark could see Lex's face perfectly, down to his wide pupils trying to soak in more light.

"Was there a fire? Are you alright? Is everyone okay?" 

"Yes, everyone's fine," Clark's voice cracked halfway through "everyone."

"Come here," Lex motioned with his hand, but Clark wouldn't move.

"No...I...uh...don't want to," now tears were clearly evident in Clark's voice even though Lex couldn't make out the ones that fell down Kent's face in the dark. 

"Fine, then I'll come to you," Lex set the gun down on the nightstand and tossed the sheet aside, "but be warned, I sleep in the nude." 

A sort of groan came from Clark. If it came from anyone else, Lex would assume that it signaled longing, but this was Clark. Sure, he'd thrown his fair share of sultry glances at Kent over the years, but the young man had never...well, seldom...reciprocated them. Still, the groan sent blood rushing south.

He swung his legs to the side of the bed, stood, and walked towards his former friend in the black. It seemed to take forever to reach Kent, but he finally did, standing a few feet away. "I'm going to turn on a light..." Lex lifted his hand. "No!" Clark cut him off, grabbing his arm before it reached the light switch and then letting it go. 

"Please don't...I just...I can't..." Clark's voice was strangled and the scent coming off him in waves was much stronger up close.

"Okay, I won't," Lex said, his voice turning soft. "But can I at least turn on this little light," he motioned in the opposite direction, "it's so low that it's like a nightlight." 

Silence passed between the pair as Clark considered it. "Okay," he conceded, biting his lip nervously. 

Lex slowly reached over and flipped the tiny light on. It didn't cast a blinding glow, but it did enough to faintly illuminate the two men. With his superior vision, Clark watched as Lex's pupils dilated in wonder and horror. 

"You were in a fire," Lex stated flatly. He was right. Clark's shirt was torn in some places and missing in others. His face and any exposed skin was smeared with jet-black soot. His hair was a wild windblown mess that stuck out in odd directions. Lex could also see the tracks of tears carving trails down Clark's dirty cheeks. 

As Clark observed the scrutiny beneath Lex's gaze, his lip quivered and more tears spilled forth. It made him feel like a little kid coming to his mother or going to the school teacher after doing something wrong, the tears coming fast at just the thought of the first words passing his lips.

"Clark...what' happened?" Lex said with such a delicateness in his voice that it didn't even sound like him. 

Clark hung his head, the rivers of tears losing traction and falling towards the plush carpeted floor. 

"I can't save everyone...I can't...I try and I can't." His chest heaved and fell in jagged waves as he talked through the tears.

Lex brought his hands to rest on Clark's biceps in a gesture of comfort. "No one's expecting you to save everyone Clark."

"Yes they are!" Clark said hotly. "I hear them all the time, screaming, crying, shouting for help. And I don't know how to pick who to save and who to...ignore," the final word twisted with such sorrow that it stung in Lex's chest. "I can't save everyone," Clark's voice was a broken, somber whine. "I can't do this. My father was right...I'm going to fail and...and..." Clark's chest heaved, his whole body seemed to shake and more tears careened downwards. "And what?" "And he said that if I didn't break from the weight of my failures, that I would break from the solitude. He said that no one would every understand me, that no one would ever love me."

The young farm-boy that Lex had always seen as a pillar of immovable strength was turning into a puddle before his eyes and it was not nearly as satisfying as he once thought it would be.

"Jonathan said those things to you?" he said incredulously, keeping his hands firmly on Clark's arms.

"No..." Clark sniffled, "my biological father." 

Woah, Clark knew his biological father? When did that happen? Who was he? Where did he come from? And he could hear people's cries? All the time? Lex's mind was in overdrive but he shut it down in favor of listening to Clark.

"He was right, I ruin everything Lex."

"No...no you don't Clark. You saved me didn't you?"

"Yeah...and then I destroyed our friendship. I ruined what we had. I wanted to tell you I was different so badly," Clark leaned heavily against the wall behind him, shaking off Lex's hands, shards of his shirt falling to the floor at the movement. 

"Maybe we can fix things Clark," Lex offered, surprised at his own offer and to see Clark shaking his head, his arms wrapped around his body like a security blanket. 

"Everything's ruined. Everything! I see the way you look at me with hatred in your eyes. And you...you're with Lana."

Lex's brow furrowed in confusion as defensiveness took over. "Hey, you had your shot with Lana," Lex couldn't help but follow up on the last remark, no matter what shape Clark was in. "You two didn't work out and she was clearly available after you two broke up." 

God, he really didn't get it.

"I don't want Lana!" Clark shouted, anger mixing with the confusion, loneliness, and despair that already churned in his tightened chest. 

Now Lex looked even more confused. 

"Then what do you want?" 

The world seemed to stand still as Lex awaited the reply to his question. Everything seemed to zero in on that moment. He could feel the plush carpet beneath his naked feet, feel the breeze of the heater floating across his shoulders, smell the rank charred perfume that poured off Clark in waves. 

"I want you," Clark said so quietly that Lex had to strain to hear. 

Lex's perception of reality had rapidly reshaped itself in the ten seconds after those three words were uttered. Up was down, down was up, and his lips hung parted, unsure of what to say. A pang of realization hitting him so hard in his chest that it felt as though he was having a heart attack. Pulse pounding so loudly in his head that he anticipated a stroke. Perhaps he'd have both. 

"Since when?" 

"Since the bridge," Clark muttered, his body's shivery shaking stopping at last. "Always...I just didn't know...didn't know what those feelings were until this last year. I kept trying to convince myself that it was just brotherly love but I knewSometimes it's unbearable how much I want you. I want to be near you, I want to touch everything beneath those fucking suits, I want to breathe in your cologne and feel your arms around me. I want your witty banter, your geeky fascination with Warrior Angel, your mythological and historical rants, your maddening arguments...I want everything."

Silence.

"And I fucked it all up," Clark's words wavered once more. 

"By the time my father was no longer a threat, by the time I could tell you my secret without getting you killed...it was too late," Clark wanted to slide down the wall, to disappear into the floor, beneath the levels of the mansion, straight into the ground. "And when I saw that room you built about me...it made me think you wanted my secrets instead of me."

"Clark," it was Lex's turn to fight back tears. 

"You can have them...my secrets."

"What if I want you instead?" Lex posited, stepping closer to Clark. 

Shit, Lex was so close, just a single breath away, his clean sleek form a stark contrast to the mess that was Clark Kent. 

"I...I can't ruin your engagement to Lana...I can't do that to her." 

"You're not, I am."

Clark shook his head. "I never should have told you how I felt...I should go.." he turned towards the door but Lex caught him by the arm and brought him back into his sphere of space. 

Less than an hour earlier he held screaming burn victims, listened to those who survived calling their loved ones, the smell of burnt flesh clung to his lungs and made him vomit several times. He witnessed death and destruction on the largest scale he'd ever seen it and it broke something inside of him. The weight of the world seemed to press down on his shoulders and he wondered if...if he was as fragile as a human...if he'd be living the life he had now, or if he'd take less for granted. As he ran from the foreign country, Clark asked himself what he wanted, what he really wanted, what he needed, who he loved...and had ended up at the foot of Lex's bed.

A sound crept up from Clark's soul and hung between he and Lex. 

Everyday he saw humans putting themselves in mortal danger for others, running into burning buildings even though they could easily perish. People called him brave, but it's easy to be brave when you're invincible. The truth was that Clark saw himself as a coward where it counted...still too afraid to let go of his secret. But if he lived today like it was his last, if he set aside fear in an effort to save himself so that he could save everyone else...if he could be as brave as everyone thought he was...he'd say...

"I'm not human Lex."


End file.
